Tomorrow morning - I've been waiting almost 5 years to preach on the words "He is not here. He is risen!"
Tomorrow is message #246 in our Real Jesus series, as we've been preaching chronologically through the 4 Gospels. Over 5 years ago God told me to do this. One reason is that we live in a horrifically Jesus-illiterate culture, and I'm doing what I can in our little context to correct that.
Tomorrow... the resurrection. And I have a preaching problem. The problem is: I have way too much to say about the resurrection of Jesus!
Way back in 1972 I was a brand new Jesus-follower. The leader of the campus ministry I was in was Bill Craig (AKA William Lane Craig). Bill introduced me to and mentored me in Jesus-resurrection studies. When Bill left the university we were at he did two Ph.Ds - one with the famous, brilliant British philosopher John Hick, and the other with the brilliant German thinker and resurrection scholar Wolfhart Pannenberg. I went off to do only one Ph.D, at Northwestern University. I wrote my dissertation on the language of resurrection, drawing on, among others. Pannenberg's classic Jesus: God and Man. Between my dissertation's completion (1986) and today I have continued to read Jesus-resurrection research from all angles supportive and sceptical. The result for me is: I believe Jesus was crucified on a cross. I believe Jesus' tomb was found empty by women. I believe God raised Jesus from the dead. And, I believe I'm going to celebrate Easter in August tomorrow at Redeemer.
